Astronomers have discovered an uncommon star system with six planets huddled immensely close to their host star — so close, in fact, that all their orbits could fit within the distance between Mercury and our sun.
Key points
- These are located just 100 light-years away from Earth. Unlike our own solar system, it appears this newfound slice of the cosmos has remained largely unchanged since its birth over a billion years ago.
- Designated HD 110067, it sits in the constellation Coma Berenices, near Virgo in the northern sky. It was detected by NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS).
- Astronomers realized early on that they were dealing with at least two so-called sub-Neptunes, which are planets about two to three times as big as Earth and blanketed by apparently puffy atmospheres.
- These are planets intermediate in size between the Earth and Neptune, and orbiting closer to their host stars than Mercury does the Sun.
